Event contact Rachel Finch

Speaker: Prof Dr Hans-Jürgen Scheruhn (Professor at Hochschule Harz University in Wernigerode, Germany - Department of Automization and Computer Science)

Dr Scheruhn obtained his PhD in Engineering from Hanover University in 1988. He has published almost 50 internationally celebrated articles and several books. Dr Scheruhn is a Board Member and the Head of Information Management Research and Development at the Global University Alliance. He helps facilitate an international platform where academics and thought leaders can interact to compare, explore and develop leading practices. Dr Scheruhn is also a certified LEAD Enterprise Architect.

Title: Developing & Applying Business Architecture by working with Meta Objects, Relations & Layers

To succeed in meeting their objectives and avert failure, organisations need a greater understanding of their business and technology assets. One of the biggest challenges organisations face is a lack of familiarity with the nature of these entities, what they have in common and how they all relate to each other. Research has proven that identifying the interrelationships is the root cause for success, but also one of the biggest challenges faced by most organisations. Since 2004, academics from the Global University Alliance have researched, compared, analysed and developed Best and Leading Practices that address this issue. The results determined that although Information Modelling, Information and Solution Architecture are considered distinct and different disciplines, they employ common objects and relations. 

By cross-referencing the common (or ‘meta’) objects to the success or failure reasons identified, it becomes clear that the inability to link subjects across areas of business, process, service, application, data, platform and infrastructure are the root cause for the discrepancies found in business models. Using the ARIS modelling suite together with its implementation through SAP Solution Manager and SAP ERP as the representative illustration, a novel approach is therefore presented that demonstrates how we can represent these models through layers that better contextualise their relevance, and the key relations within and between these layers.